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Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
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Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#592I got my driver's license in Sweden, and the official driving handbook completely worships manual transmissions, and makes several untrue claims about how much better they are than automatics. You can choose to do your road test in an automatic, but that'll earn you a restriction on your license, barring you from driving a manual. It's probably fair, but almost everyone (myself included) chooses to practice in manual…
>when automatic transmissions are consistently outperforming humans at fuel efficiency Do you have data to back this up? Unless you're driving a dual clutch "dry" transmission or a CVT, because of Physics, an automatic transmission will always be less efficient. The Automatic transmission Torque converter [1] will waste some of the energy provided by the engine, especially with city driving. Also, most automatic cars…
I can give examples of cases where it's NOT true.
Subaru BRZ/WRX manuals have better Milage EPA ratings than their automatic counterparts.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#593Earlier quoted context omitted.
Simple understanding on how a car works - "wheels turn the engine" when in gear, otherwise fuel is consumed when in neutral..
Not so simple. Until recently, a standard ICE couldn't stop injecting fuel while coasting (unless you turned the car off, which brings other problems...). I remember when I was learning to drive being taught about engine braking (with an automatic) and the tradeoff between using up the brakes or burning fuel.
For every fuel-injected engine the ECU should cut injection when coasting. So "recently" in your case applies to carburettors which will behave as if the engine were idle and thus still feed fuel to the engine. I'm not sure 25 years ago counts as "recently".
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#594It's an interesting discussion. I've driven both stick and automatic for 35+ years. The choice was usually whatever I could lay my hands on, such as various cast-off, used, and borrowed cars.
My family owned a full size Dodge van with a 3-speed automatic that was quite primitive, but we took it on vacations, and drove it under the most absurd conditions -- snow, ice, gravel, dirt, off-road, you name it. There were specialized vehicles for off-road use, but not a lot of people had them. It was before the era of the SUV.
I think if you drive an automatic car for a while, especially one as bad as that Dodge van, you develop a feel for when it's going to shift. You can nudge it up and down with the gas pedal. This is just a matter of being an attentive driver.
Today, I prefer automatic, but am not in a hurry to get rid of our one car with stick. I just like automation and convenience. Stepping on a pedal and pushing a lever back and forth hundreds of times, just to get from A to B in one piece, seems gratuitous. Hell, my wash machine chooses gears by itself, why shouldn't my car?
I definitely made sure my daughter learned to drive stick. She took her drivers test on it.
Is fuel economy important? Sure, but I save fuel in many ways: Driving a smaller car, combining / eliminating trips, riding my bike, carpooling, etc. When I see a giant SUV being used for daily commuting, I doubt the automatic tranny is the reason why it's a waste of fuel.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#595Just got back from another trip to Europe where I encountered the slightly odd European preference for manuals. I can kind of see why, the car culture is quite different from the States -- where most cars are two or three generations beyond the kind of automatics most Europeans associate with the transmission type. The inverse is that most European diesels are two or three generations beyond what most Americans assoc…
Are you seriously saying a modern full sized automatic sedan is more efficient than a modern compact car? Or are you actually comparing a modern sedan to an old compact?
Those turbocharged <1L little hatchbacks would absolutely trounce your big car for efficiency. And for a lot of people, whose primary use of a car is taking themselves to work, it makes an awful lot of sense.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#596Just got back from another trip to Europe where I encountered the slightly odd European preference for manuals. I can kind of see why, the car culture is quite different from the States -- where most cars are two or three generations beyond the kind of automatics most Europeans associate with the transmission type. The inverse is that most European diesels are two or three generations beyond what most Americans assoc…
It isn't an "odd European preference". In this case, it is the USA that is the outlier, with most of the rest of the world preferring manuals. Fuel efficiency is not a wife's tale but rather a statistical fact, except perhaps for very new, very expensive high end luxury cars where an automatic can have a slight edge under somewhat dodgy laboratory conditions. And "being more in control" is also a fact. You cannot be…
No, there's nothing weird about it, but the stories about why they are better are pretty much entirely down to "well I like it better." Okay, that's fine.
But statistically, CAFE standards aren't being met by manuals, but by automatics and other advanced drivetrains. People can yell "but physics!" all they want, but the aggregate data is showing clearly that manual drivetrains are not the path towards increased efficiency. So clearly physics are favoring non-manuals.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#597Holy crap, I didn't realise it was quite like that. I knew it was rare for people to know manual transmissions but why such a preference for automatic? In Australia pretty much everyone I know can drive manual, most cars come with the option and most cheaper cars are manual. It was somewhat of a masculinity thing too, and still is according to my younger siblings. To be honest I'm surprised the most that America does…
> No engine braking The DSG [1] is quite nice to drive and uses engine braking. Careful feel for the throttle is required, but the same applies to operating clutch... [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct-shift_gearbox
Agreed. And while using the sequential shifter or paddles is engaging for performance driving or screwing around, I've also found that modern TCUs are scary efficient even in automatic mode, able to respond appropriately (fuel-saving in eco mode for example) to hill grade, corner exits, overtakes, red-light crawls from what I'm guessing are the use of accelerometers on top of existing drivetrain telemetry and just some good heuristics.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#598Just got back from another trip to Europe where I encountered the slightly odd European preference for manuals. I can kind of see why, the car culture is quite different from the States -- where most cars are two or three generations beyond the kind of automatics most Europeans associate with the transmission type. The inverse is that most European diesels are two or three generations beyond what most Americans assoc…
Are you seriously saying a modern full sized automatic sedan is more efficient than a modern compact car? Or are you actually comparing a modern sedan to an old compact? Those turbocharged <1L little hatchbacks would absolutely trounce your big car for efficiency. And for a lot of people, whose primary use of a car is taking themselves to work, it makes an awful lot of sense.
Yes, and I actually provided the economy figures in my comment. It's crazy, but modern drivetrains in big cars can make the big cars more efficient than small hatchbacks.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#599The car sales environment makes it particularly hard to buy a manual car these days. Even for cars which are still made in manual like the BMW 340i and the Nissan Juke, it is impossible to find a manual version on a dealership lot. I don't know if it's because they acknowledge they're harder to sell, or because they don't like people test driving manuals, but either way you will be ordering your car if you want it as a stick. That generally corresponds to a 6-10 week wait for your car, which doesn't align well with an American public who want their car today.
Re: Fewer than 3% of cars sold in the U.S. have manual transmissions
#600Earlier quoted context omitted.
>when automatic transmissions are consistently outperforming humans at fuel efficiency Do you have data to back this up? Unless you're driving a dual clutch "dry" transmission or a CVT, because of Physics, an automatic transmission will always be less efficient. The Automatic transmission Torque converter [1] will waste some of the energy provided by the engine, especially with city driving. Also, most automatic cars…
In modern cars, disengaging the clutch (or using neutral) when coasting (toward a stop or down a hill) is less efficient than staying in gear. This is because it takes some fuel to keep the engine idling, where staying in gear allows the computer to completely cut fuel flow, as long as the forward motion is keeping the engine turning.
"In modern cars, disengaging the clutch (or using neutral) when coasting (toward a stop or down a hill) is less efficient than staying in gear. This is because it takes some fuel to keep the engine idling, where staying in gear allows the computer to completely cut fuel flow, as long as the forward motion is keeping the engine turning."
This is very interesting - thank you.
I shift cars into neutral while going down hills because I strongly dislike the subtle lurching of the hill descent control ...
I never thought I was saving any appreciable fuel.
However, what does happen is that (provided you don't mind speeding) you exit the bottom of the hill with much more stored energy, allowing you to coast (in or out of gear) much further before it is necessary to apply the throttle again.
So it's interesting that the direct effect of coasting in neutral does not save fuel - however I still think the net effect (again, provided you don't mind speeding when exiting a hill) is fuel-saving ...